This is Kari

I was an abuse victim of Fanda, as outlined in the documentation supplied on this site. My story was covered up by NTM.

Years later, I had a life of deep depression, drug addiction, a runaway with a death wish. I was full of self hate and anger and insecurity. I told my parents in a letter from one of my rehabs to give up on me. “Consider me dead already”, I said, “I do.” I believed in God but believed he cared nothing for me.

In the last few years I was introduced to a grace-based church and have come back to Christ and a life of passion and joy that I am so privileged to know. I look back on my wasted years and instead see so much life sprouting there. I am humbled by the relentless sowers along my path who were not dissuaded though I treated them with contempt. I’d been hinting at coming back to Christ when a few years ago God tackled me and brought me to my knees in tears at His goodness and grace. I still spend a lot of time there. Legalism taught me that God hated me but Grace taught me that I am loved indeed. Legalism bound me to impossible perfection but Grace freed me and gave me a heart that longs to obey Him. I still sin, I am remarkable at it, but by the grace of God I get up again to seek Him. I am the prodigal daughter and my testimony is this, there is no life apart from Christ, it is only a half-life, a cheap copy, a chasing after the wind. What I have in Him is life to the fullest. Life Indeed.

While I am one of the creators behind this blog and know that I am not to stop until all this is brought into the open, I want to encourage everyone that this life is ours to claim today! We do not need to wait for repentance or an apology or retribution or justice to start living a joyous life. While my heart longs for it, I know repentance from NTM or even justice is not something my life hinges upon. And today I can forgive because I’ve been forgiven indeed. Even me.

29 Responses to This is Kari

@One who has issues with NTM
OWHIWNTM, you ask some very good questions. From what I can tell, one thing we are up against is that most of the missionaries who abused children do not believe that they did anything that was harmful or hurtful. Seriously. Many MKs have posted about horrible memories they have of physical, emotional and spiritual abuse, but even to this day, most of the adults who abused in this way would insist to you that all they were doing was trying to “train up a child in the way they should go”. Harsh physical abuse, attempts to modify behavior by extreme ridicule and humiliation, and heavy pressure put on children to conform to certain spiritual norms were all COMMON in the NTM school environments in the past. In ALL of NTM’s schools abroad. Even the sexual abuse, many perpetrators will deny. Granted, there were some missionary pedophiles who actually sexually assaulted children. But there were many others whose crimes were easier for them to rationalize: inappropriate touching, inappropriate comments or conversations, demands for children to kiss adults, “games” that made children very uncomfortable that would be rationalized away by the adults. This, I believe, is one reason many adults have not manned up and fessed up. They would tell you to your face that they did nothing wrong. We are fighting an uphill battle. I anticipate that even if or when many adults are confronted with the wrong they did to children, they will continue to claim they are innocent and are being wrongfully accused. Grrr ….

I read some ones post, and now I can’t find it. But they wanted to know where the proof was for accusing NTM of their horrific deeds. My question is, “How much pain does a victim have to go through to prove they are really a victim. Is not their pain enough? When they share their vulnerability with the world in hopes of healing and justice, is that not enough. It is taking so long for anything to come of all this abuse. To me, it is black and white. The culprits know who they are. They are cowards in my eyes and in my heart. Is the time the victims have to wait to see justice for the crimes commited against them not enough? Why make them keep going through this. Man up and Fess up. These folks who were once children should not have to face any more pain, but then there is life we must continue to live even after the facts. At least, to those who have had a part in this wickedness, QUIT HIDING! You know that in the end, you will have to be accountable to God almighty, you might as well do it now!

to kari
I too am an abuse victim of a thirty year “super christian” marriage to a former NTM School graduate. I am the sister of a Field Representative and know many who are now or (MOSTLY) formerly with NTM as field missionaries and in field leadership or in administrative leadership in the states. <> I have felt this for at least 30 YEARS!!! The problems I could recount are too numerous too mention but COVER UP is the name of their game. The reverberant immorality and suffering is too big to measure. PERIOD. Indiviuals tied to NTM (currently or formerly) are seriously supportive of each other and others in Christian work who are “human.” NOWHERE is accountability a standard. It comes in many forms, mostly in vagueness to being human. IT SEEMS TO ALWAYS be someone else’s duty to forgive (scripture, scripture, scripture..) which must not be reasoned but immediate to be pure. The perpetrators and their filthy links of support, never deem repentance as NECESSARY or deem it as an offering. They grossly mis-enforce “Grace” and “Restoration”, or try to by demand and endless rhetoric tied to scripture (the abuse of it, that is).
At some point people have to refuse the interaction with NTM and its individuals to obtain clarity.
You are brave and doing a righteous, difficult, difficult thing. I am amazed at your strength and I support your ongoing efforts.
Kari, it is other fields, it is leadership, it is co-dependancy, it is NTM “friends” back in the states, etc……..

i understand that posts made on any public forum like facebook are considered public domain, but still the considerate thing to do is NOT re-post people’s words on websites on which they did not specifically want their words posted.

i am respectfully asking you to consider how you word your comments. put yourself in the shoes of these mk’s and try to imagine how that abuse must have felt…or if you have a daughter, try to imagine how you would feel if she endured something like this.

i do wonder how they can sleep at night…but not because of any “untruths” they may be stating…but because of the horror they endured. please be sensitive to that…

Observer, I have NEVER posted on this blog but this one I felt needed to be addressed urgently! When you have a sixty-eight page report made by a qualified organization with endless testimonial truth, I think that would be enough to say, the truth is prevailing. God’s Word states in, at least six places or more that a fact will be established only at the word of two or three witnesses. There are more than two or three in this whole issue. With proof after proof, witness after witness, there is no way one can say that this has been fabricated.

Our family substituted Kari’s family in the Budik tribe but we have never met her personally and, in the sixteen years I lived there, we never communicated with her. I did although, live under the circumstances her parents worked under. I lived in the same place, in the very house they built themselves, and with the same people. For sixteen years I pieced a story together about Kari and her family and I can guarantee you one thing, NOTHING she has said has EVER contradicted that story. I am a living witness. I can vouch for what you have said, “What’s true is true!”

God is to be praised at how he is using you, his little lost sheep, that he left the other 99 for you, just so you could be at this place today. He is using you to help so many others and bringing justice that is well needed to so many wounded. You are a diamond in the rough that is becoming his jewel. May you shine brightly in the world of abuse as He leads you. God bless you!!

Kari God is so great in drawing us to Himself, the only one who can heal all the hurts in our lives. The past year has shown the strength He has given you to keep to the task. I pray that you are now supported by many others who will not stop looking for truth and transparency in not only NTM but all missions. Child abuse must be stopped in missions and churches. If NTM responds correctly this could be a breakthrough for the Christian church world wide. Thanks again for all you at Fanda Eagles have done.

Thank you for sharing your story Kari. Going public with abuse and hurt is so tough. It has been a theme in our parents church years that abuse is the fault of the victim. We know in fact that it is not. Vengeance is Gods! One day he will vindicate you weather here on earth or in a timeless exsistence where it will be more of an impact! I pray that healing is yours and fully healing! I know that day to day life can be hard! Know that I am praying for you!

Thank you Kari for writing and speaking up. Forgive me for not asking more questions about this and blindly accepting that all had been taken care of. Through this hopefully abuse that might be going on now can be stopped. God is using you to touch others and protect others. Well done.

Kari:
Guess I’m just waking up to some things and didn’t even realize these stories were here. Call me blind….but God gives life and eyes to see! Thank you for sharing what you have. You are truly amazing (I suppose that may sound like humdrum ditto to what others have said. I will never say that anything that happened in my story is in the same category as those of you and many others of our “children”…but there is the same death that the same FAther gives life to…and reveals himself as delighting in his children….
Keep going, and help us understand better how to truly love.

In one of the many books that my wife, Faith, has studied, the author states that in her experience as a counselor the most important factor in healing is for the victim to be able to tell their story. It seems to me that when it comes to the issue of sexual abuse the church has done almost everything wrong that we could possibly do wrong. The victims of this evil were told to forgive and forget (which is still what is being taught by many of our christian leaders) which amounts to ” just be quiet and don’t rock the boat”. The one thing that might help a victim to heal and find some comfort by telling their story, we have said you should not do. We as the Body of Christ must wake up and confront offenders holding them accountible for their sin. We also need to repent of our failures in dealing with this issue. http://speakingtruthinlove.org

I just read this yesterday, and I thought of your blog, and the wounded hearts here. It happened to Paul Young, author of “The Shack” too. What the enemy meant to steal, kill, and destroy, can be turned around by GOD into hope and redemption for every precious one here and for scores of other broken wounded hearts whom your testimonies touch.

But the terror of my past was rarely far beneath the surface, no matter how hard I tried to hide it. I was always running from half-buried memories, haunted by doubts, doubts that said if anyone really knew who I was deep inside, no one could possibly love that damaged and frightened person…

In desperation I started seeing a therapist, two to three times a week. For the first time I asked another human being to enter into my life and help me heal. It was the first I’d told anyone what had happened to me as a boy growing up in New Guinea.

My parents were missionaries to a primitive people and in those days missionary children were only allowed to be with their parents until they reached school age. At six I was sent to a boarding school. Sexual abuse that had already been occurring at the hands of the tribe since I was four now continued at the missionary school. I was terrorized, brutalized, dehumanized.

The deep examination of what I had undergone nauseated me. Shame had become the very air I breathed, just another word for self-hatred. But if I were to change, if I were to heal, I would have to face the worst…

I also acknowledge that God was always there for me even when i felt that no-one else was. I had shut him out for a long time but could never not believe that he was there waiting for me. People do bad things, sometimes in Gods name, but God gave us all the freedom of choice and unfortunately, this is why bad things happen to people that God loves so much! i forgive because he forgave me, and I LIVE because of forgiveness.